


Fragments

by paleolithic_demitasse



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-29
Updated: 2015-10-29
Packaged: 2018-04-28 18:26:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5101094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paleolithic_demitasse/pseuds/paleolithic_demitasse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>“I’m not wearing the hat.”</i><br/><i>“Come on, Sherlock, you know Lestrade isn’t exactly giving you a choice.”</i><br/><i>“And you know how much I don’t want to attend this press conference, hat or no hat.”</i><br/><i>“Please, Sherlock. For me.”</i><br/><i>“…Fine.”</i><br/><br/>A day in the lives of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Fragments

Sun streamed in from the window, the early morning light giving the flat a cosy look. The cosy colours of warmth and the warmth of cosy colours filled the air with an invisible yet unmissable sense of peace. This was a morning for slow-paced thoughts and even slower movements.

“Good morning, love.”

The gruff, just-woke-up voice came from behind Sherlock. He turned around, lips moving into a soft smile as he saw John in the silk dressing gown that usually adorned his own shoulders.

“You’re making tea. You never make tea.”

Sherlock just smiled back.

“I do now.” He said. _I do for you_ , he meant.

Surprising both Sherlock and himself, John slowly – _carefully_ – embraced Sherlock from behind as he turned back towards the boiling kettle. Sherlock straightened the teacups sitting on the kitchen counter with one hand as the other went to rest on John’s, which were clasped around his waist. As if he was something precious that John couldn't bear to let go of.

Both of them smiled privately, unaware that the other was doing the same.

*

“I'm not wearing the hat.”

“Come on, Sherlock, you know Lestrade isn't exactly giving you a choice.”

“And you know how much I don’t want to attend this press conference, hat or no hat.”

“Please, Sherlock. For me.”

“…Fine.”

*

They were sitting on a park bench, watching the world go by. There was minimal noise, just words lost to the wind and the distant drone of London traffic. The rushing city seemed oblivious to the two men standing still, observing its busy dash to nowhere in particular.

The evening was unusually warm; not a sticky, sweaty warm, but a comforting heat. Like falling into bed after a long, long day. Even better, it was like falling into bed with someone who you loved and who loved you back after a long, long day of not realising it.

That, Sherlock realised, was exactly what it felt like to be with John. Home at the end of a long road. There was nowhere he would rather be.

*

Sherlock’s hair was soft to the touch, a tangle of silky black thread far too shiny not to have seen an unhealthy amount of conditioner in its recent life. (John knew for a fact that there was a bottle of the stuff in the shower, and it wasn't his.) For some reason, John imagined it slowly greying, losing its texture to the inescapable passing of time. He tried to imagine Sherlock as an old man, but found that he couldn't. It was impossible to envision Sherlock without the electricity that fried the air around him.

While John dismissed these thoughts as early-morning cloudy mindedness, said electrical unit hummed happily as John stroked his hair, cuddling up to him. John was reading the paper on the sofa with a lap full of Sherlock. Not a bad way to start the day. Apart from the fact that Sherlock’s veins appeared to be bubbling with energy that John most definitely did not possess. As John kept reading, Sherlock sunk deeper and deeper into the boredom that so easily consumed him.

_Pay attention to me!_ Sherlock pleaded silently as he cuddled closer to John, nuzzling his face into John’s neck, kissing it as he did so. Closer, always closer – that seemed to be the aim of a lot of things Sherlock did those days, and John didn't mind in the least. Closer to John.

_Not now_ , soothed John’s fingers that were still in Sherlock’s hair, fondly playing with his curls.

_Please_. With the precision of a scientist and the care of a lover, Sherlock pressed a gentle line of kisses from just below John’s ear along his jaw down to his throat, before working his way up to John’s lips. Sherlock paused, locking eyes with John, who was pretending to be annoyed at being forced to put down his paper. Then Sherlock leaned in, positioning his lips right next to John’s, barely making contact. They were sharing air, they were sharing space and they may as well have been sharing thoughts as John closed his eyes and Sherlock followed suit.

Neither moved. Instead, they stayed there, not quite kissing, noses brushing, foreheads pressed together. It was more than intimacy, far more. It might have been love, but it felt bigger than that too.

It was just them. Just Sherlock and John. And that meant more than anything.

*

 “Look, I don’t care what state the kitchen is in now, as long as you clean it up before I get back without enlisting Mrs Hudson’s help, all right?”

“Yes, yes, I know.”

“Good. And remember to get milk – hold on, I heard the front door, I think Harry’s back. Like I said, I’ll be back for dinner. See you soon.”

“Wait!”

“Yes, Sherlock?”

“…Miss you.”

“I miss you too. I’ll see you tonight. Bye.”

*

Sherlock was playing that song again. It was one that he had composed, John had heard him labour over the piece for weeks, playing it to death and back, and was clearly quite proud of the finished product. John adored it.

It wasn't very long, and John was almost certain that he had it committed to memory, etched (nay, carved) with dedication into the walls of his mind, albeit with a degree of skill-lessness inevitable to a mere observer of Sherlock’s undeniably first-class music.

(Whenever John tried to visualise his own memories or thoughts, he couldn't help but imagine them as primitive drawings on a cave wall. John had a strong suspicion that his inner caveman sentiments were the result of prolonged exposure the grandeur and brilliance of Sherlock’s infinitely sophisticated mind palace. Not that he minded being humbled by Sherlock; with a genius mind like his, it was as unavoidable as it was a privilege. He has tried to explain this to Sherlock once, but the detective had just looked at him like he was insane. John hadn't tried again.)

Gently, John swayed his head to the tune, humming unconsciously to the dark flat. It was late, and John was only awake because Sherlock was. John has assumed Sherlock was lost in restless thought, and had gone to either find an answer or lose himself in his music. That assumption had been promptly squashed as John heard what was being played.

This wasn't a Thinking Song. Sherlock had a few songs that he played when he was deep in contemplation, about a case or about other things, that he came back to time and time again as sure as the sun rose from the East. Thinking Songs were long, melodic and as fulfilling as music could be. What Sherlock was playing was too melancholy and too heartfelt to be a Thinking Song. John considered that for a moment. It was an emotional piece, but the melancholy of the music wasn't a bittersweet song of longing or loss, but rather a fond reflection on a memory that used to hurt, like the sad smile that people got when they were remembering lovers past and friends departed. That wasn't to say that it wasn't full of love and joy and a hundred other beautiful emotions that came packaged with the kind of euphoria that made people believe in the world again.

It wasn't a Happy Song either, the kind Sherlock would play to work off excited energy the same way some people went for runs. Nor was it a Sad Song, or an Angry Song. It was the song that John could never label or define, and he had been trying for ages. Nonetheless, the song remained as elusive as a half-remembered dream. As frustrating as it sounded, John had long since found that – quite to his surprise –the piece combined with the way Sherlock played it was beautiful enough to never tire of trying to understand it.

The song was coming to its end. John smiled as the music rose and fell, dipped and flounced, somewhere between the fluid movements of an elegant dancer and an honest exposition by a talented actor. Closing his eyes, John felt himself relax against the kitchen doorway he was leaning in as the final notes of the song danced through the flat, clinging to the air as they faded, replaced by the comparatively empty silence.

Sherlock stood facing the window, violin and bow still raised, eyes probably closed. John didn't have to open his own eyes to see that – it was what he did whenever he finished That Song.

“It’s for you.” Sherlock said softly.

“What?” John opened his eyes to see Sherlock’s back still turned to him.

“That song. It’s for you. It’s about you. It’s…” Sherlock hesitated.

“It’s beautiful.” John murmured.

Sherlock turned around, eyes sparkling. His smile melted John’s heart. “Just like you.”

John smiled back, offering all the sincerity that he could not put into words. “You know, I could never decide exactly what it was. The song, I mean. Every time I thought I knew, it slipped away again. It was too beautiful to reduce to words.”

“And now,” Sherlock said, “you understand how I feel about you.”

*

Sherlock smiled into John’s hair as he heard the ex-army doctor begin to snore softly. There was something about feeling John fall asleep in his arms that made him feel disgustingly warm inside. He closed his eyes and inhaled. John smelt like home. John _was_ home, in every sense, and quite possibly the first Sherlock had ever truly had. Definitely the last, because it didn't take a detective to know that nothing would ever feel like this, this right, ever again.

Slowly allowing his eyelids to flutter shut, Sherlock gently drifted off into the sea of unconsciousness, knowing as sure as he knew his own name that John would be there when he woke up.

*

Noise, nothing but noise. Noisy people, noisy lights, noisy mind. It seemed Sherlock Holmes could not catch a break.

He huffed. This press conference was ridiculous. Nothing but ammunition for the guns of the tabloid press, which could just as soon be pointed at his head as they were at the woman Sherlock had ‘assisted’ Scotland Yard in exposing before three murder victims became four. His legs bounced up and down with no semblance of control against the floor, bumping sporadically into John, who was sat next to him at the rickety table of Scotland Yard’s press room.

John cleared his throat deliberately. Apparently, being bored out of one’s mind during the most numbingly dull part of one’s career was A Bit Not Good. Sherlock resisted the urge to roll his eyes. This whole thing was appallingly tedious. Lestrade was still prattling on about the culprit’s ex-girlfriend who actually had nothing to do with it since she was clearly having an affair with—

Brakes screeching wildly, Sherlock’s train of thought came to a sudden halt as he processed John’s hand carefully wrapping itself around his. Immediately, his knees stopped bouncing and John would later claim that he’d ‘be damned if you didn't blush bright red, Sherlock’. Not moving his eyes from their glazed stare beyond the cameras and the reporters, Sherlock intertwined his fingers with John’s.

He could have sworn he saw John smile, but his peripheral vision was blurry from staring into the lights.

*

“Sherlock? I'm back. Where are you?”

“John.”

“There you are! What are you doing in your dressing gown?”

“Didn't feel like being dressed.”

“Fair enough. C’mere.”

“…John.”

“Right here.”

“I made dinner.”

“You… _what_?”

“I made dinner. The last of the three prescribed meals of the day, if we’re following the generally accepted social convention regarding mealtimes. What’s so strange about that? John? Why are you laughing? John?”

 “Oh… my God, Sherlock. It’s just, you've _never_ — well. You did once, but the kitchen is still here, so it can’t be _that_ bad.”

“Like you said, that was once, and I told you it wasn't my fault! The instructions said to leave the mixture ‘on fire’, how was I supposed to know that it meant ‘on _the_ fire’? If anything is to blame, it’s a stupid grammatical error made by an amateur chef who’s obviously never written a recipe before, not— John, I thought you had finished laughing.”

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry! You’re just— you’re something else.”

“And is that a good thing?”

“Wouldn't have it any other way.”

*

Early morning near silence greets John as he slowly opens his eyes. He breathes deeply, filling his lungs with fresher (well, fresher than what was already there) morning air. ‘Sher—’ John begins to say before realising that Sherlock’s— no, that _their_ bed is empty. Resisting the urge to sigh, John sat up gradually, surveying Sh— their room. It has been surprisingly easy to adjust to the fact that most days, even on weekends, Sherlock was not likely to lie in for longer than five minutes after he woke up. When Sherlock had asked why John was so nonchalant about it, he’d responded that ‘it must be because I know you so well’, half-jokingly. Sherlock had just smiled an achingly soft smile.

The sound of the kettle boiling in the kitchen interrupts his thoughts. A quick glance at the clock on the bedside table revealed that it was too early for Mrs Hudson to be upstairs, but it was equally unlike Sherlock to go anywhere near any kitchen appliance that was not being used as a substitute for some piece of scientific equipment. A momentary wave of concern bordering on panic crashed, louder than thunder, against the shores of John’s newly awoken mind. What if there was someone in the flat? He dismissed the thought immediately. The soldier in him was overreacting. _An unwanted visitor would not be making themselves a cuppa,_ he reasoned to himself.

Sitting up straighter, John listened to the sounds leaking through their door. He could make out a distant pattering of footsteps that definitely belonged to one Sherlock Holmes. John smiled at himself, shaking his head slightly. Of course it was Sherlock.

A faint humming made John’s smile widen even further. Sherlock was humming one of his pieces, and it sounded almost as good in that deep baritone as it did coming from the strings of a violin.

John closed his eyes, cherishing the rare feeling of being happy and nothing but.

It was going to be a good day.

*

“That was awful. I'm never going to another one of New Scotland Yard’s idiotic press conferences if my life depends on it.”

“How about mine?”

“Don’t even joke about that.”

“Fine, sorry.”

“…I’d go to five consecutive two-hour press conferences for you.”

“Only five?”

“Well. Maybe six, if you were really in trouble.”

“You flatter me. Sherlock Holmes, you are one of a kind.”

“As are you.”

“Well, now that we've established that, where to? Home?”

“How about we take a detour?”

“All right. And what exactly does this detour entail?”

“Regent’s Park, then lunch?”

“Brilliant.”

*

John watched Sherlock peer into the microscope, almost afraid to ask what the experiment of the day was. It wasn't a case or John would have had something to do other than sit around, reading a mystery novel that wished it was half as exciting as his life.

As if reading his mind, Sherlock called from the kitchen into the living room. “Still no case?” Apparently John wasn't the only one itching for something else to do.

“Nope, nothing.”

But that didn't make sense. Sherlock did have something to do, he was in the middle of some quite possibly ridiculous, obscure scientific investigation. So why was he asking about a case? It was almost as if the detective somehow just _knew_ that John needed something to do. Needed to do something—

_Bugger._ Thought John loudly and no small portion angrily. He _did_ have something to do, something he had been meaning to do for ages but had never found the time for between cases and, well, Sherlock.

John needed to go see Harry.

“I need to go see Harry.” called John from his chair, not bothering to turn around. And yet, he still felt Sherlock’s gaze rise from the lens of his microscope to burn a hole through the back of his head.

“When?”

John checked his watch. “An hour ago.”

Sherlock said nothing.

Getting up was an embarrassingly difficult affair as John had made himself quite comfortable in his chair. He made his way to the coffee table to pick up and pocket his phone and wallet, then walked into the kitchen to say goodbye to Sherlock.

Hesitant to disturb his partner’s work but even more hesitant to leave without some kind of acknowledgement on both their parts (for the sakes of John, Sherlock and Mrs Hudson, who would no doubt be asked to help tidy up any explosions that would probably be the result of John leaving _sans adieu_ ), John lent down to plant a quick kiss on Sherlock’s cheek. “I’ll see you later.” he murmured, pulling away. Sherlock remained silent. Sighing, John tried and failed to not roll his eyes and headed for the door.

“John.”

Hand on the doorknob, John turned to face the direction of the voice calling him, and his eyes widened slightly in surprise and possibly a little bit of affection. Sherlock had turned to face him, looking John in the eyes like he’d never see him again. It was as if the experiment had ceased to ever exist. All of Sherlock’s intense focus had been shifted, for all the world like John was the only thing in it. The energy of a condensed sun was staring at him, right through him. His hand fell from the doorknob.

“When will you be back?”

John’s face softened into a smile, his voice as warm as his features. “I’ll be home for dinner, I promise.”

Sherlock was visibly relieved. “Okay. Good. Good, that’s really…good.” He turned away, and if it had been anyone other than Sherlock John would have been sure he was embarrassed. Shaking his head slightly, fond smile still attached, John strode back over to where Sherlock was seated at the kitchen table.

“Come here, you.” John tried not to laugh as he buried his nose in Sherlock’s raven curls. He slid his hands up Sherlock’s back and onto his shoulders, gently massaging his tense neck.

When Sherlock turned around, John could see stars in his eyes.

Still smiling (the thing appeared to be stuck to his face), John cupped Sherlock’s face in his hands, looking meaningfully into his eyes before pressing a kiss to his lips.

“I promise.” John repeated, leaving quickly before leaving stopped being an option at all. Sherlock watched him go.

*

Frowning, Sherlock picked at the food he had prepared. “This,” he muttered, “is not what I had in mind.”

John politely disguised his laughter with a cough.

Watching John push food around his plate, Sherlock wondered how long it would take for him to give up and suggest they order Chinese.

“It’s…” John began, spearing a mouthful of chicken with his fork, “got an interesting flavour. That is indisputable.”

Sherlock snorted, glancing longingly towards the phone on the kitchen counter. Just out of reach…

Alas, all hope of ending both their suffering was swiftly dashed as John valiantly carried on attempting to compliment Sherlock’s meal without flat out lying. Despite the fact that his pride hurt after his attempt at a romantic gesture had failed miserably, Sherlock couldn't help but be impressed by John’s efforts. Defending his terrible cooking, Sherlock decided, could not be an easy task.

“The rice is rather… nice.” John continued, not looking Sherlock in the eye lest his delicate poker face crumble into laughter.

“I mean, it’s really quite…” John was fighting a losing battle.

“Appalling?” offered Sherlock, taking pity on John and eager to move onto something more edible.

“Yes.” John said flatly. “This cooking is truly awful. Absolutely—”

“—bloody horrifying.” Sherlock finished.

They looked at each other for a moment before bursting with laughter. The sound of the two men giggling uncontrollably filled the flat, and suddenly it felt infinitely warmer.

“Sherlock…” John began, trying to speak around his breathless laughter.  Sherlock looked up at him, which proved to be a mistake when both detective and blogger began laughing once again, quite possibly harder than before.

Once their laughter had subsided to giggles and wheezes, John tried again. “Seriously, Sherlock, what the hell did you do?” John asked, reaching for his glass of water. He hoped the smile on his face offset the indelicacy of the question.

Completely unoffended, Sherlock thought for a moment before replying. “It may have been the fact that I cross-referenced and combined twelve different recipes for the same dish.”

John choked on the water he was drinking. “ _Why_?” was all he could manage, spluttering.

Sherlock shrugged. “For maximum accuracy, of course.”

Shaking his head and trying very hard not to laugh, John reached over the table to kiss Sherlock chastely but firmly. “Thank you.” he said, meaning it.

“Now,” John began slowly, pulling away, “are we going to order Chinese or Thai?”

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to Hanna for waiting, and to Jennifer for her fluffy rabeet.
> 
> Un-beta'd, thanks to _someone _(*cough* HAMZAH *cough*), so all mistakes are mine alone.__  
>   
>  Thanks for reading!  
> 


End file.
